In the competitive nature of the HDTV industry, there are a lot of ways to get noticed. You can make a really high quality television, or innovate in some way that’s new and exciting. Or, you can do what Samsung did and make another really thin TV. The “Needle Slim” Samsung LCD features a 120Hz refresh rate and a reported contrast of 5000:1.

It sports LED backlighting, but whether edge lighting or local dimming is featured is unannounced at this point. It offers a 40” screen and a depth of only 3.9mm. For comparison, a standard #2 pencil is 6mm thick, and Samsung’s new display is less than 2/3 the size.

Samsung’s new backlit LCD doesn’t add a lot of functionality, nor does it promise an improvement in picture quality, but we can’t argue with the fact that it’s really impressively thin. They’ll certainly be eager to get this to market, but as of yet further details including pricing and availability remain unannounced.